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Editorial: County ignores responsibility for ag mess

Posted:
10/28/2017 08:10:10 PM MDT

A tractor and planter belonging to Schlagel Farms on county-owned agricultural land last spring. (Lewis Geyer / Staff Photographer)

The polarization of our national politics is based not just on differing ideologies, but also on different perceptions of reality, of facts. Hence the recent addition to our lexicon of "alternative facts."

As the late Daniel Patrick Moynihan said, "You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts." So it was particularly disconcerting last week to see an alternate version of reality afflict our local politics as well.

When an ongoing conflict over county-owned agricultural land reached a standoff Tuesday, two of three Boulder County commissioners acted as if they bore no responsibility whatever. Eric Lane, the county's director of parks and open space, along with Commissioners Elise Jones and Deb Gardner, laid the entire blame for what Jones called "this polarized climate" on local farmers as the commission rejected bids, for the second time, to conduct a Sustainable Agriculture Research and Innovation Initiative (SARII).

This abdication of responsibility came after a 2-1 vote in April, with Jones and Gardner in the majority, to ban genetically-engineered crops from county-owned land, threatening the livelihoods of family farmers who grow GE corn and sugar beets on that land. The decision, which fulfilled campaign promises by the two commissioners to an activist, largely urban ideological lobby, came barely five years after a different set of commissioners voted unanimously to allow GE sugar beets and to continue allowing GE corn (first approved in 2003) on county-owned land.

"Making the farmer the villain in this discussion is not appropriate," Commissioner Cindy Domenico said at that December 2011 meeting — prophetically, as it turned out. "They are partners in stewardship of this land."

Farmers are accustomed to dealing with unpredictable weather and other natural conditions in Boulder's difficult, semi-arid growing environment. They are less accustomed to dealing with political winds over which they have no control. Nor are they particularly fond of being told how to do their jobs by city folk who have never done them. They thought the idea of banning GM crops for political reasons and then embarking on a study (SARII) to see what might replace them was a backwards process, and said so.

Perhaps most telling, the only commissioner from a farming family, Domenico, whose family traces its farming roots to the 19th century, agreed with them and voted against the ban. Jones and Gardner were unmoved. If one assumed their lack of farming experience might confer a certain humility, one would have been mistaken.

Alas, when they tried to establish the study, they did it in a manner that can only be described as incompetent. They were apparently unaware competitive bidding would be required. As a result they named their preferred bidder in advance, a Pennsylvania-based advocate of organic farming certain to deliver the outcome their political constituency preferred. When they had to backtrack and put the study out for bid, their announced bias tainted the process and, combined with a small budget, limited interest from other bidders. It did not help that the county solicited people from Colorado State University to help draft the request for proposals and then to bid on it in partnership with the preferred bidder, an ethical no-no.

Lane professed befuddlement that anyone could question the state's land-grant university as a contractor, ignoring that conflict of interest, which an independent ethics expert said fatally polluted the process. Jones expressed befuddlement that "the beneficiaries" of the prospective study would fight the biased version she tried to engineer. Gardner also regretted "the lack of cooperation" by farmers forced into a corner by the commissioners' political decision.

The only county official tethered to reality was Domenico, who, regrettably, is term-limited and will leave office at the end of next year. This is what she said:

"We did talk about this [study] back in 2011, 2012, as a possibility. It was a very exciting opportunity. I'm sad that we're in the place that we are right now, but I have to say that I don't lay the full blame on producers who have a different perspective than we do. I think we are half the issue here in terms of having the polarized environment that we do.

"I think we had a balance two years ago, three years ago, that has now been undermined and destroyed, and that we have as much responsibility for that as our producers do. I think that we made a decision to move away from GM crops. We did it in the face of science that said that there is a balance, there are other opportunities, and I know there are people on different sides of this very charged political issue.

"I still find myself on the side of science and on the side of balance and diversity across our cropping lands. I think that without the full benefit of all the information and realistic determinations, that we've set this process in motion as it is right now. So we need to deal with the consequences of our actions.

"I'm sorry, very sorry that the effort around SARII is not able to go forward. I think we're in a place where it doesn't make fiscal sense to invest at this point in time. And I think that we owe it to our family farmers to have an honest and thorough conversation about the timeline that we arbitrarily set for a transition away from GM crops. So I sadly have to say I agree with your recommendation about the initiative at this point."

We fear that urging Jones and Gardner to acknowledge their role in the current dysfunction will be no more productive than it has been to this point. They seem incapable of accepting any responsibility. Still, we hope they will consider Domenico's words carefully. A big part of capable leadership is accountability. We hope to see more of it from Jones and Gardner when it comes time in a couple of months to review the timeline for the GMO transition.

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